


The Calculating Commoner - Prologue

by writteninweakness



Category: Ouran High School Host Club - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, Child Neglect, Denial of Feelings, F/M, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-24
Updated: 2019-11-24
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:08:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,738
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21548116
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writteninweakness/pseuds/writteninweakness
Summary: A strange boy becomes the neighbor of the Fujioka family. This changes everything. And nothing, at the same time.
Relationships: Fujioka Haruhi/Ootori Kyouya
Comments: 18
Kudos: 76





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So back when I first binge watched Ouran and read the manga and got obsessed with it, I started several fics with AUs for Kyoya (and Kyoya/Haruhi.) Only one of them ended up becoming a full story, but a while back I was looking for a way to make this one and the other one into a one-shot, so I posted them to tumblr.
> 
> Well... due to some mental health issues, I've deleted my tumblr, and I only have a [blog](https://writteninweakness.blogspot.com/) to post a few fan related things and my prompt lists and occasional status updates because I do have some fics in progress that I need to finish/update, though things are getting in the way of that and writer's block is such a joy, especially with depression and anxiety.
> 
> Anyway, this idea seemed to be popular, and it was originally meant to be more (I'd say this is the prologue/first one or two chapters, but I'll just call it prologue) since they were going to go to Ouran and Kyoya was going to end up in charge of the club's finances as before, but my ability to write that far deserted me, so I will just post what I have for now.

* * *

The Ootori family had a reputation for being ruthless negotiators.

And when their youngest child, the third son named Kyoya, was taken from them at the young age of five, they did not give into the demands of the kidnappers, not even after they maimed one of the boy’s protection detail.

When the deadline passed one week later, they were shown photographic proof their son was dead.

They were never given a body.

* * *

Ryoji stopped to watch the car pull up in front of the apartment building. A woman got out from the driver’s side and went around to open the back door, waiting impatiently as the boy came out very slowly, his eyes taking in his surroundings like he was afraid of everything he saw. He had his arms wrapped tight around his body, and when the woman reached for his hand, he flinched and bumped into the car.

Kotoko came up next to him, little Haruhi in her arms. “What is it?”

Ryoji wasn’t sure, not exactly, but he didn’t like the looks of that woman. She grabbed the boy by his hand and dragged him along, up the stairs and to their neighbor’s apartment. The door opened, and she went inside with him.

“Oh,” Kotoko said. “I know her. She’s with the welfare agency.”

“Does that mean that poor boy is being placed with… with _them?”_ Ryoji asked, shaking his head. He couldn’t believe such a terrible thing was about to happen. Their neighbors were polite but soulless, without any sort of kindness he could tell, and from the way they reacted to Haruhi, he found it strange they’d want a child anywhere near them.

“They do have a business,” Kotoko reminded him, and he made a face, well aware of that practice and not liking it much at all. “And without a daughter, it’s probably better they do it this way. The adoption could be good for him.”

Ryoji frowned. Sometimes he wondered if he should be the mother and Kotoko the father since his maternal instincts screamed at him to rescue the boy as soon as possible. That home was not a loving one, and who wanted their shabby business anyway?

She touched his back. “Come on, we’d better go inside.”

He followed her up the stairs. The other woman stepped out of the apartment, shaking her head as she did. “Give them a quiet one, they said. Quiet ones are best. One that won’t make a fuss. Boy hasn’t spoken a word in all the time we’ve had him, and it’s not enough? I hate this job.”

Ryoji started towards her, but Kotoko caught him, refusing to let him go after her. “Ryoji, most children don’t get adopted. It’s adult males that do. Give them a bit of time. He could be more fortunate than you think.”

* * *

He wasn’t fortunate, though they would only learn that later, through Haruhi.

She’d seen the boy sitting by the window, but he never came outside and never went to the park. So she sat down day after day, reading her picture books and anything else she got her hands on, near that apartment window. She didn’t think that her neighbors would mind—they were never home, and it wasn’t like the window ever seemed to be open.

After about a week or so of this, she noticed the window _was_ open, and though she didn’t see anyone, she read her books aloud instead of to herself.

One day when she came by, the door opened part way through her reading, and she found herself scooting over to show the pictures as she read. This happened a few more times and then stopped so suddenly it scared her.

The window stayed closed. The door was shut. This happened for a week, and she got worried. She didn’t like when she couldn’t see him, and she was scared something happened to her friend, so she knocked and knocked until the door finally opened.

“Are you sick?”

He shook his head.

“Did you get in trouble for listening to me?”

Another shake of the head.

“They didn’t hurt you?”

A third shake of his head, and Haruhi didn’t know what else to ask him. She held up the book. “This one’s new. I just got it from the library. It’s got a good story and lots of pictures. Here. Let me show it to you.”

He shook his head and started to shut the door.

“Wait, what’s wrong? Why don’t you like my books anymore? You don’t like the pictures? I think they’re very pretty.”

He lowered his head and wrapped his arms around his legs. “Can’t see them.”

“What?”

“Can’t see them.”

“You can’t see colors?”

He shut the door then, and even though she pounded on it, he didn’t open it again for days.

* * *

Since Ryoji strongly felt that being colorblind should be no deterrent to any child’s life, even if it was so, so, very sad, he went with Haruhi to persuade the boy out of his home. He wanted to see for himself that the child was doing well, and Haruhi’s sadness over it proved just the excuse he needed to barge right in.

“Life is still beautiful in gray and black, nothing beats a little black dress.”

The boy stared at him, looking very much like he wanted to run. Ryoji should have worn some of Kotoko’s clothes for this.

“I can point out which colors are which if you like.”

He shook his head, rising and heading toward the back of the apartment. Along the way, he hit just about everything in his path and ended up falling before he reached the hallway.

“Oh, you poor precious thing,” Ryoji said, picking him up and trying to cuddle him even as he shoved desperately trying to get free. “It’s not that you can’t see the pictures. You can’t see at all, can you? My poor little darling.”

Haruhi frowned. “Dad, that’s not right. He could tell when I was there even when the window wasn’t open, and he can move around and open the doors. He always looks at me when I’m reading.”

“He better not be looking at my little girl.”

Ryoji thought he might have heard someone say idiot, but that couldn’t be right as Haruhi would never say that about her father.

“I know,” she said, lifting her finger in the air in triumph as she figured it out. “I bet he needs glasses like I do.”

“Oh, is that all? Well, we can fix that.”

* * *

Ryoji was all for dragging him off and getting him glasses that instant, but Kotoko insisted on doing things properly since they would likely get in trouble with his adoptive parents and possibly accused of kidnapping. He was already guilty of trespassing since the boy hadn’t really let him in, and she wanted to keep him out of jail.

Of course, they didn’t seem to want to hear what Ryoji and Kotoko had to say, since they were clearly interfering and had no business telling them how to raise their son.

“I’m not your son,” the boy said, startling both of them. “And I’m tired of being unable to see properly.”

“He can talk?”

“He never talks.”

“I knew she tricked us.”

The boy’s expression clearly said he thought that his adoptive parents were idiots. He walked his way back to his room, leaving the rest of them there with the awkward silence.

* * *

From what Ryoji could see, his neighbors’ attitude towards their “son” worsened, and they barely paid any attention to him at all, gone even more hours of the day and never so much as asking someone to watch him despite how young he was. He was quiet most of the time and didn’t do much, didn’t ever leave the house, but he and Kotoko knew that was more to do with his vision problems than anything else. He was well-behaved, and he deserved better.

So one day they took him out, got him to Haruhi’s eye doctor, and sure enough, the boy’s eyes were just as bad as hers.

Once the glasses were acquired, it was not uncommon to see the two of them sitting together and reading, and though Ryoji had never thought he’d see someone read more than his own precious daughter, this boy did. He read everything he could get his hands on and then some.

When it came time for school to start again, the boy presented Kotoko with his relevant papers and asked her to register her him in classes.

“You can’t actually do that, can you?” Haruhi asked, and he looked over at her, pushing his glasses back up his nose as though offended. Ryoji had to admit that boy could look scary, but if he thought he could bully his daughter, he could think again. Ryoji would never allow that to happen.

“It should be his legal guardian—”

“Not that, Mom,” Haruhi said. “It’s the papers. They’ve got the wrong name on them. His name is Kyoya, not Mitsunori.”

“What?”

The boy frowned at her. “Why do I tell you anything, anyway?”

* * *

Turns out, Haruhi was right.

Kotoko met with the boy’s social worker, and she explained—very against her will but then Kotoko was a very formidable woman and a successful lawyer. She’d even made a few threats considering what they knew of why he’d been placed there and how poorly he’d been treated by everyone, since no one even bothered to check his eyes. And what a tragic tale! When Kyoya—as Haruhi insisted on calling him—was found, it was during a police raid. The boy hadn’t spoken a word, though the drug dealer they’d arrested swore he’d never touched the kid or seen him before.

The police knew he was lying, but they never did get him to tell them where the boy came from, and since he wasn’t willing to speak, he’d never told anyone he had a name. No one knew about that or his vision problems, since he kept to himself, barely moved, and never spoke, which was pretty much everything his foster parents asked for.

Haruhi had gotten him to speak for the first time in years, and in some ways, Ryoji regretted it, as that boy did have a smart mouth sometimes. Still, Haruhi usually brushed it off or said something just as rude back to him, and it was clear they were already good friends.

Though if that boy thought he was taking Ryoji’s precious daughter from him, he was sadly mistaken.

* * *

Having Kyoya around somehow softened the blow of losing Kotoko. Not by much, nothing could, but when she was gone and Ryoji was missing her terribly, he still had Haruhi and her friend to look after. Though they had adopted Kyoya, his neighbors took little note of him and seemed to prefer he spend most of his time out of their house, which he did anyway.

On paper, he belonged to them. In spirit, he was Ryoji’s, even if he sometimes felt both the kids felt they were more of an adult than he was.

Kyoya took over their finances and managed them rather ruthlessly, especially for a boy his age, but Haruhi made sure Kyoya allowed Ryoji enough money for pretty things, and he found solace in that now that Kotoko was gone.

Haruhi missed her mother desperately, and the only consolation Ryoji had was that he wasn’t leaving her alone every night when he went to work. Kyoya was there.

And somehow, the three of them made it through.

* * *

Until, that was, the two of them decided to apply for scholarships to Ouran Academy.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kyoya and Haruhi have differing ideas about life and high school.

* * *

'You do realize he was trying to ask you to go out with him, don’t you?”

Haurhi’s eyes widened, and she looked over at her best friend, staring in disbelief as he didn’t even look up from the book he was reading. Kyoya was kidding, wasn’t he? He had to be. No one got that many invitations to go out—well, no one but Kyoya, who usually just looked at the girls and made them run off in tears without even saying a word. She didn’t understand that—Kyoya was a sweetheart, really he was, both to her and her father—but he could be pretty cold to their schoolmates and others, especially his adoptive parents, though she could hardly blame him for that.

“No.”

Kyoya stopped to push up his glasses. “Please stop being so dense. You are smart and kind and apparently highly desirable to this group of idiots we find ourselves surrounded by at this school.”

“You don’t have to be so mean.”

“I just gave you a compliment.”

She lowered her eyes and tried not to flush. For some reason, Kyoya’s compliments always made her get red, even if he was being mean to everyone else and she shouldn’t be pleased by what he said at all. She shook her head, trying to ignore it.

“I don’t plan to date until I’m done with college,” Haruhi said. “I want my career to be well-established before I start thinking about romance. It’s not that important to me, and it always seems to get so messy on television and in books, so I think it’s better if I wait. I’m not in any hurry.”

Kyoya said nothing, and she swallowed, wondering if she’d somehow said something wrong, only how could he see that as wrong? Wasn’t he planning on doing the same?

“You’re still planning to wait, aren’t you?”

Kyoya adjusted his glasses. “I admit there is little advantage to it before I am of age and can make decisions for myself instead of manipulating those two or avoiding them entirely, but I haven’t entirely ruled out the possibility.”

“You haven’t?” Haruhi found that surprising. “Whenever a girl comes up to you, you give her that scary glare of yours and make her run away.”

“You are the only female in this class with any intelligence.”

She tried not to flush again. Why were Kyoya’s mean comments so appealing to her? She was being stupid, and she didn’t like it. She shouldn’t let him say stuff like that, either. “You know that’s not true.”

Kyoya shook his head. “No, you know it is. This school is wasted on either of us. You don’t even have to study as hard as you do. You’d still be second place in our grade, first if we were not in the same year.”

She tried not to shudder. She didn’t want to think about that. Being separated from Kyoya at school would be awful. Sure, there were plenty of nice kids here, but nice wasn’t the same as Kyoya, who had been there on the scary nights with thunder when her dad was working. Even her father said he wasn’t sure they’d have made it through losing her mom if not for Kyoya. They’d probably have lost their apartment and moved somewhere less nice, but somehow Kyoya managed to make sure they stayed within budget and let her father get a bit crazy about his pretty stuff so he stayed happy and drank less.

“I still don’t want them asking me all the time.”

“There is a solution to that.”

“Oh?”

“Say yes to one of them.”

“What? I don’t want to date. How is that a solution?”

“If you had a boyfriend, the amount of boys asking you would be reduced significantly. Perhaps to zero, though some ill-mannered people will still ask.”

She grimaced. He wasn’t wrong about that, but she didn’t want to date anyone. They’d want to go out and do things and keep her away from her studies. She did do fun things with Kyoya, and he always made sure they were in the budget, but more importantly, she could do things like this all the time, just sit here with him and study.

“Kyoya,” she began, not sure if she’d just had a brilliant idea or the worst one ever. “What if _you_ were that boyfriend?”

His silence told her this was, in fact, the worst idea ever. She grimaced. She could try and explain it so she didn’t ruin their friendship. She didn’t want to do that.

“I just meant that—”

“I know what you meant.” Kyoya’s voice was a bit strange, and she reached over to push the book down as much as she was afraid of what she’d see if she did. “Very well. We can do this, but only if you tell your father first and stress that it was _your_ idea.”

“Kyoya, Dad loves you. Why would you think he wouldn’t like it? After all, it’s only—”

“You are his only daughter, and you were not present when he lectured me on teenage boys. If you want to do this, those are my terms.”

“That’s it?”

Kyoya set down his book. “Because you’re you, you have no idea what you’re actually asking for, Haruhi. Still, I have agreed, with those stipulations.”

“Thank you.” She said. _I think._ “Okay, I’ll talk to Dad when we get home. Oh, but we need to walk past the market today. They’re having a sale.”

“You told me that earlier.”

She smiled at him. “You never forget anything, do you?”

His smile in exchange was thin and not at all happy. “Perhaps not.”

* * *

“A lovely meal as usual, Haruhi,” Ryoji said as he wiped at his mouth. “You always make such wonderful things. You’re going to make someone such a wonderful wife someday.”

“Dad—”

“I know, I know, you plan to be a wonderful lawyer, but your mother was both, you know. She cooked _and_ defended justice. She was such a wonderful woman,” Ryoji said, and Haruhi swore he was going to start crying again. She knew her dad still missed her mom, and it wasn’t like he shouldn’t be allowed to cry, but sometimes when he got like this, she just wanted to hold her hand over his mouth and stop him. “And you’re so like her. You will be a good wife.”

“Dad,” she said, shaking her head since she really didn’t want to discuss romance with him now or even ever. “I’m not doing that until after college. You know this.”

“Of course I do, and I’m so glad you feel that way. I’m not sure Daddy will ever be ready for that day to come.”

“Speaking of,” Kyoya began, “there is—”

“Now, now, Kyoya, though you have long been like a son to me, that does not mean that I will let you steal her away from me.”

Haruhi tried not to groan. “He’s not planning on dating until he’s free of those jerks they call his guardians, and he wouldn’t want me. I had to bug him just to get him to _pretend_ to date me.”

Ryoji dropped his spoon. “What?”

Kyoya took off his glasses, sighing as he cleaned off the soup that had just splashed on them. “You would find the worst possible way to broach that subject or the nearest thing to it.”

“Kyoya,” she said, now hurt. She shook her head. “Dad, it’s not what you think. It’s just that I’ve been getting a lot of guys asking me out, and even though sometimes I don’t even realize it, I… I’m tired of them asking and I don’t want to hurt anyone, but they don’t seem to understand that I mean it about not dating. So I asked Kyoya if he’d pretend we were dating so that they’d stop asking and leave me alone. Nothing would change. We’re still friends. It’ll be just like it is now.”

Ryoji frowned. “Just like now?”

“Sure. Why not? Why would anything change?”

Ryoji looked over at Kyoya. “You actually agreed to this?”

“It has some benefits to me as well,” Kyoya said, replacing his glasses and resuming his meal. “I do not wish to be pestered by a bunch of idiots, either, as well as being able to have less interruptions where someone wants to ask Haruhi out while we are studying.”

“Hmm.”

“It’s fine, Dad,” Haruhi insisted. She wasn’t at all bothered by Kyoya’s reaction. It was so like him. “And we really do need to have the interruptions stop so we can pass our entrance exams.”

“Oh, my darling daughter is off to high school!” Ryoji clapped his hands together, and now he was going to cry for an entirely different reason. “I just can’t believe this. She’s growing up so fast. I’m not ready. Oh, Kotoko...”

Haruhi tried not to wince, but she felt Kyoya’s eyes on her and knew she hadn’t managed it.

“If you’re finished with your food, we should do the dishes.”

Haruhi smiled. Kyoya was always pretty helpful, making sure she didn’t have to do all the housework—at least not alone. She knew part of that was because the less he used in his own “home,” the better. His adoptive parents barely gave him anything, and what he did have he’d gotten himself, since he really didn’t care for Ryoji’s hand-me-downs. Still, it wasn’t right that they got away with what they did. They didn’t hurt him, but they made it clear they didn’t want him and didn’t want to spend anything extra on him. It was wrong that Kyoya had to come up with so many different ways to get money, though he was good at them and very creative.

She carried her own dishes into the kitchen, following after Kyoya as Ryoji sat at the table, still sighing to himself.

“There is one thing to consider,” Kyoya said as he started preparing the water.

“I thought we already agreed we were applying to Ouran.”

Kyoya shook his head. “That’s not what I meant. I meant this pretense you desire. It will seem strange to everyone you’ve turned down and told you’re not interested in dating that you’re suddenly dating someone.”

“I don’t see why. We’ve known each other for years now. It’s not like I’m picking a stranger.”

“A stranger might be more likely. They’d understand that you were… swept off your feet.”

She put a hand to her mouth, trying hard and failing not to laugh at Kyoya’s expression when he said that. He frowned even more as she did, and she almost doubled over. She would have if he hadn’t chosen that moment to shake out the sponge and splatter her shirt with it. “Hey.”

“Oh, did that get you?”

“You know it did, and we both know you did it on purpose.”

Kyoya smirked, and she wanted to hit him. “Nevertheless, my point stands. You have made no secret of the fact that we’re ‘just friends’ and that I’m ‘like a brother’ to you. People will find the change unbelievable unless you’re willing to work to sell it.”

She looked back at her father, who had the photo albums out again, making her cringe. She turned back to Kyoya. “I assume you have some sort of plan?”

“I can think of a few ideas.”

She picked up a cup and washed it, passing it to Kyoya to rinse and set in the strainer. “Like what?”

“Like me telling you I wasn’t following you to that overpriced rich kid’s asylum known as Ouran.”

She stared at him. “What? We agreed—”

“We didn’t. You did, and I’ve humored you so far, but I believe there are plenty of other schools that will give us the same quality of education if not better, considering that Ouran is a business that must cater to its affluent alumni and their children. They have to keep them happy, likely pamper them, even if it means reducing academic standards and—”

“That’s not what they do.”

“So you insist because you’re dead set on going there, but I doubt you have any real understanding of what you’re getting yourself into.”

“You don’t know that it will be that bad.”

“I’m not going.”

“Yes, you are. I’m not doing this without you, and you promised me and—”

“No. You are strong enough to go alone if you want to go. Leave me out of it.” He turned to go, and she reached out with a soapy hand to catch him before he could.

“Please, Kyoya. I know I can do this without you, but… I don’t _want_ to. We’ve never been apart, not since you moved in next door. We’re… we’re a team, remember? You’re going to head the business and do the numbers, and I’ll be the lawyer and...” She looked up at him, not sure what else she could say to convince him. “Please.”

He took a breath, and she could tell he still wanted to say no, but he finally let it out and nodded. “Very well. I’ll go, assuming there are enough scholarships and we both get high enough marks on the exams to be accepted.”

She threw her arms around him. “Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

“One time would have been enough.”

She laughed, still clinging to him.

* * *

And that, more or less, was the story of how they started dating.

* * *

“Kyoya.”

Ryoji’s voice stopped him just outside the door. He looked back at the man who’d become a very strange surrogate father to him and frowned. It wasn’t like Ryoji to keep him late, not when he still guarded Haruhi’s virtue with a dangerous zeal and Kyoya could well end up locked out of his adoptive parents’ apartment again if he was much later.

“Yes?”

Ryoji shut the door behind him. “Are you really okay with this?”

“I would think of the two of us you’d have more reason to object.”

Ryoji smacked his head, and Kyoya grimaced. “Don’t you go being like that. I practically raised you, you know, and a father knows things. Like how you’ve been in love with Haruhi since you first met her. And don’t you even go start denying it. Your social worker told us you never spoke a word all that time you were in the orphanage, no one knew your name or anything about you, but you told her. She’s special to you. She always has been.”

“I think at that age, one has no real comprehension of that kind of love, and I do not know that I was familiar with the platonic kind, either,” Kyoya said, considering that for a moment. He remembered little of the time before the group home, and what he did have aside from his name was pain and a woman. His sense of her was vague at best, but he didn’t think she was the cause of the pain.

He didn’t know. His memories were not clear, and from what he knew of the situation, which had been told to him by Ryoji and Kotoko, no one knew anything of him from before that police raid.

“You can manipulate those two idiots next door, and you do it brilliantly, but I _know_ you. I know when you’re changing the subject, though only a fool wouldn’t. And yes, sometimes I am a great fool, but when it comes to my children’s happiness, I am—”

“A very large amount of metaphors we can skip for this particular evening,” Kyoya said, getting a glare from Ryoji, but the man would go off on an hour long tangent describing himself as anything from a mama bear to all sorts of animals from various cartoons if not stopped quickly. “I know.”

“Then why are you agreeing to pretend to date her when you want to date her for real?”

Kyoya sighed. There was no avoiding this conversation. If he ran, he’d just annoy his adoptive parents and end up locked out to face Ryoji’s round two. “If, as you say, I have such feelings for her, then I know her well, don’t I? And I would know that she intends to wait her romantic pursuits until she’s finished establishing her career. Any other boy would lose their chance simply by failing to wait, so I need not worry about that. I have more patience. And when I _do_ ask, she will say yes.”

Ryoji frowned at him. “You’re so sure of that, are you?”

“Reasonably so, yes.” Kyoya knew there was still a chance Haruhi’s feelings could change, but he’d noticed her blushing nearly every time he complimented her, so he thought there was some chance of her feeling something for him, but he also knew any boy who pushed her for a relationship before she finished establishing her career would be turned down no matter how she felt about them. That was who she was.

She was also so dense it might take her that long to figure out how she felt about him. Kyoya had no illusions about her character.

“Reasonably sure is not the same as being sure.”

Kyoya just smiled. “A successful strategist plans for the worst as well as the best.”

Ryoji threw his hands up and went back inside, and Kyoya had a feeling he’d be going to sulk for a while and would want to buy something else pretty tomorrow. He made a note to adjust the budget before he crossed to the other door, finding it locked again. He closed his eyes, taking a breath and letting it out. He needed to find someone who could teach him to pick locks. He’d tried reading about it, but so far that hadn’t made it possible to gain entry to his bedroom after they’d locked up.

Any time he had a key made, they changed the locks, which they could do as often as they wanted, running a hardware store as they did, so he didn’t bother to fight them about it anymore.

He went back into the Fujioka apartment and settled in for another uncomfortable night on the couch.

* * *

Holding hands was a simple enough proclamation that they were dating, at least to Haruhi’s mind, though all Kyoya did when she suggested it was grunt. Then again, she shouldn’t be surprised. He was never in a good mood the morning after his adoptive parents locked him out. He wasn’t much of a morning person to begin with, but he was ten times worse when they did that.

And she still didn’t see why that kind of thing didn’t get him taken away from those people and to a better place. Then again, Kyoya always told her it was the lesser of two evils, since he’d likely be stuck in the group home again if they ever did pull him out. They wouldn’t give Ryoji custody of him, not with his hours and their unstable living situation. It was all Kyoya could do to keep Ryoji’s spending in check, and all his efforts did go to waste if Ryoji got drunk enough.

She sighed, leaning her head against Kyoya’s arm as they walked. She loved her father, she did, but he was like a big kid himself, and he didn’t handle her mother’s death well.

“What is it?”

“Thinking about Dad.” _And you,_ she thought, but she knew she didn’t dare say it. “I think he’s about to go on one of his spending binges. I shouldn’t have reminded him that we were taking the entrance exams.”

Kyoya grimaced. “Perhaps not, but it couldn’t be helped. We are going to need to take them soon.”

“You are going to take the one for Ouran, right?”

“I do not see why you are so set on it.”

She frowned. “Since when are you so against it? You never objected before, but now you seem to hate it. Is there something you’re not telling me? What is wrong with Ouran?”

Kyoya took a breath before letting it out to explain. “I was thinking it might be better to go to a school with a dormitory.”

“You want to go somewhere that far away?”

“I got locked out of my home again,” he reminded her, his voice colder than usual, trying to cover how upset he was. He said it angrily, but he was hurting and she knew it. “It would be better for me to go somewhere that room and board is included, even if it is farther away. I’m sure they’d want that, too, since they want nothing to do with me.”

“Oh.” She should have thought about it herself. Kyoya was right, but even so, her chest got tight at the idea of him going away somewhere. She knew the path she’d chosen, and maybe it wasn’t for him, but she still wanted him to be a part of it. “Um… We’ll figure something out, okay?”

He nodded, preoccupied. She hoped that she could find a way to make it work for both of them. If he got into a school like Ouran, would that change anything? Would his adoptive parents actually see him as person, as worth something and not just the obligation they couldn’t get rid of?

“Fujioka-chan?”

Haruhi tried not to wince. That was the boy Numata-san who’d asked her out yesterday, wasn’t it? He sounded upset, too.

“Good morning, Numata-san,” she said, trying to smile for him.

Kyoya did not smile. At all. “Did you need something?”

“Kyoya,” she said, but he just pushed his glasses up, and she knew he was just about to give him one of his evil smiles. She didn’t want that. The boy’d been hurt enough yesterday. “We’re not in a hurry right now.”

“I am, but if you want to go on your own—”

“No,” she said, wrapping her hand around the one of his already holding hers. She wasn’t losing him to some other school, not now. “We’re going together, remember?”

Kyoya’s smile reminded her of a cat in cream, but she’d always liked that look on him. She supposed it helped that the first time she’d ever seen it, he’d just finished manipulating his adoptive parents. That shouldn’t be a good thing, but he’d done it so she wasn’t alone during the thunderstorm, and she would always be grateful that he had.

Kyoya was a good person, really, but he only seemed willing to show that to her or her father, no one else. She hoped someday other people got to see it, too, but that might never happen if they went to separate high schools.

Fine, then. She’d do whatever it took to keep him with her.


End file.
